Due to one stupid bolt, I am NOT going to make any power on the dyno this time.

Long story short, I've spent the last week drilling thru one of my wheel studs as the threads at the hub had stripped and it was just spinning in place (gotta love 16 year old parts!). I had my neighbor (a retired mechanic with $10K of SnapOn tools in his garage) come over and help me with every possible tool, to no avail. He said only two options, go to a shop and have them tack weld the back of the bolt and remove the nut or drill thru it. Several broken drill bits and a million charges of a cordless drill later....I finally got thru the damn bolt.

Just taking a break before I get everything together, but I missed out on a week to tune. Only have a little bit of time tomorrow to tune. Oh well, at least I'll get there in my miata assuming no other major mishaps.

Side note: every now and then a minor issue that takes forever makes me consider parting out the damn car....

 

I trust you can still get a tune by then...only took me a few days, set aside a few hours after work, heck even show up and have one of us ride along and tune your maps before you dyno.

oh well, at least it's back in operating mode.

 

if your msq is far off, you could just put mine in. it should be close enough that 30min. of tweaking to suit your car will give you a damn good tune.

 

easier to just order the hub assembly... for next time.

 

Wouldn't it have been easier to rent/borrow/steal a welder and do the tack weld thing in your garage?

 

Or you could have asked me to DHL you a f%&king hub assembly.

 

I thought about the hub assembly thing, but I couldn't really get into that area as the wheel was still attached to the hub. Well, there won't be a next time as I replaced all the freaking studs just to be safe.

 

Tom = needs air tools.

 

those NE cars are a bitch - I remember having a wheel bearing go bad between races and ended up removing the hub, half shaft and lower control arm as an assembly because of all the corrossion.

 

Tom used air tools to no avail. Couldn't use the air compressor with the drill bits or they would burn/break. Had to drill in short bursts to keep the bit from glazing.

 

damn ngga, leat you know those grade 8 bolts for the roll bar do there job.

 

I've had a though time getting the suspension and control arms out of the parts miata, even using the big snap on impact gun running off 200+ psi. But so far, with enough effort, I have been able to move every bolt I've started on, though one I had to use a hammer to get started (and then cut the bashed up end of it off and it pushed through)

 

On this older Mustang that came in my shop the Weld wheels were bent from wheelies and we tried to take it off, the drivers side had a stud that spun in the hub. We had to spin and pull until it drilled through the rotor. Replace the hub and then someone stupid put the wheel back on, same thing again. I know how much those spinning studs suck. There really is no easy way.

 

tom i knew you'd eventually have a problem when i saw how damn tight your were putting those lugnuts on

 

I use a torque wrench everytime to 80 ft-lbs as per spec. Why is that too tight? That's what really got me, as I always hand tighten the nuts first then torque in proper sequence to 80 ft-lbs. Am I missing something?

 

80 ft-lbs. is nothing too. I pretty much hand tighten mine to 75. (i torque to 80)

 

just kidding tom, i was just remembering the time you were at johns and had to leave and was scrambling to get the car back together

 

that sucks dude..... reminds me of the time I had a 3 day long fight with the front pass side brake rotor on my rx7....... finally let it win and went and got another hub assembly from a junkyard....

 

Holy ***** dude. My trick to getting off a stuck rotor: most rotors have a threaded hole in them. find a bolt that threads in and turn by hand until tight. Then give the bolt 2 revolutions with a wrench. The bolt presses against the hub just a little. Then get a medium hammer and give the center of the rotor a whack. That has freed up every rusted *** rotor I've ever touched, including on cars that were literally left in a field for 20 years.

 

Ahhh....good times....NOT! At least I can laugh about it now, and I got home without setting the car on fire!